I don't like your plan, Robert. First, keep in mind that while the K6 and the Klamath haven't been offerred for sale, they cetainly have been introduced and demonstrated. Benchmarks are available for the Klamath, and every OEM in the country must have one by now if they want one. The K6 was shown at COMDEX, way back in November. So far the only company silent about its product is Cyrix. It is amazing to me that they have been as silent as they have been, and ill-advised as well. I am sure that there are OEMs out there that have already committed to building systems based on the K6, and who will take only a brief look at the M2, if that. They plan months in advance. Surely you don't think they just say "I think this week I'll use M2's". No, it is a big expense to support a new processor, and plans must be made far in advance. No doubt the big guys have already committed to what they will be using this summer, and will soon be looking at chips they might want to use next fall or winter. Thus by being silent for so long, I believe Cyrix has already missed summer introductions at big OEMs. They probably did this knowing that they wouldn't have enough capacity to satisfy an AST or a CPQ until at least fall, anyway. If they wait until the Klamath is introduced to begin promoting the M2 they can forget the big OEMs until at least 1998. Sure there are fly-by-the-seat-of-the-pants operators who can change CPUs at the drop of the hat, but everyone else needs time.
By my estimation, the second silicon of the M2 should be ready about now, plus or minus a week or two. Thus if everything is OK, they will sample the big accounts shortly, and demo the chips at CeBit. They need all the publicity they can get between now and mid-May, or whenever the chips are actually available for sale. They may want to send samples for testing to the magazines. They want to make sure that there is massive consumer demand the minute the chips are offerred so that they sell out from day one. They want whatever OEMs who choose the M2 to be immediately successful. What they don't want is to suddenly say "Oh, and by the way, we have a chip, too, that you might want to look at." They can't afford a massive simultaneous ad & point of sale campaign like Intel did for MMX, so they need to start getting free press. AMD is doing exactly the right thing, and the K6 is getting plenty of press, and unfortunately I think there are alot of OEMs trying to decide between the K6 and Klammath and Pentium MMX, and the M2 isn't even under consideration. Furthermore, with a late start Cyrix will have to give them some convincing reason why they should be considered, too.
Carl |
